We’ve been here for a week, enjoying the sights, the food, and some down time. Jay’s taken some great pictures, many of which he’s posted, but I want to include them here, with his commentary.

“Here are some pictures from Barcelona. The first are of a park designed by Gaudi in the early 20th century. The guy was wild! I mean he must have dropped from another planet or time, because who was doing anything like that then? Nobody.”

“Also some fun pictures of Barcelona and of my sweetie pie and me.”

 

 

We are here for two weeks, and taking advantage of that to ease our way into the city. We’ve been exploring the various neighborhoods, the old, the new, the gothic, the cosmopolitan. Today we had our first look at Gaudi, whose work is beyond.

Just, beyond.

We’re saving most of our Gaudi sight seeing for later in the week, when we’ll be joined by friends from home. So we stopped by the Cathedral of Barcelona.

 

 

 

Almost too hot to go out, even though they cover the sidewalks.

 But we did eventually find our way to the Cathedral, and from there to a great restaurant where Jay had cod in yet another form and I had a fantastic mojito. Oh, and food also.

 

I had the scallops.

In Granada we stayed at Santa Isabel la Real, a restored house from the 16th century.

 

Our favorite place for lunch was Maria’s. That’s Maria sitting at the table on the left.

 

The Alhambra has always been high on my list of things to see. Like so many of the places we’ve visited, it has a complicated history that involves plenty of misery and bloodshed. Originally built as a small fortress in 889 A.D., it was expanded and converted into an Islamic palace and fortress complex in the 13th and 14th century and was occupied by a series of Muslim sultans until 1492, when the city fell to Christian armies.

At the entrance to the Palace

We had a wonderful guide who spent several hours with us. We began our tour at the summer home built as part of the complex: it’s called the Generalife. It was designed as a place apart from the palace, which was always felt to be a place of business. This is where the royal family – the emir, his wives and concubines – went to relax and cool down. Given that it was 100 degrees when we were in Granada (most unseasonable, according to our guide) we were happy to be out of the sun.

The Generalife is surrounded by lush gardens, but these were added later by the Europeans. The original gardens were planted with vegetables.

There are lots of open spaces and great views. The open spaces were outfitted with cushions, low tables for comfortable entertaining.

Next we visited the Palace, the Alhambra of my imagination. The entrance is similar: the water in the center was an important design element.

The Palace appears to have two doors –

– but really there’s only one! The door on the right is false, and was designed to fool invading armies, who would presumably waste time trying to bash it open.

The outer simplicity of the Alhambra is deliberate – all the richness is on the inside.

Here is the Sultana’s room. The two windows represent her two eyes.

Below is the biggest room in the Palace. It’s where the sultan received guests. He would sit at the back of the room, with the light behind him: visitors could only see his silhouette.

A better look at the ceiling:

This is also the room where in 1492 Christopher Columbus asked the newly empowered Christian monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella to authorize his expedition.

It’s  also the room where, that same year, Isabella signed the decree expelling the Jews (200,000 of them) from Spain.

Back to the Sultan: he was allowed four wives and as many concubines as he could support. This was the area they occupied the Harem – a word that contrary to popular understanding means ‘home’.

More on Granada to come.

A few days here, just enough to see some of the sights, learn some history from a wonderful guide, and eat some great food.

The Alcazar, a spectacular  palace originally built by the Moors, rebuilt  by generations of Christians, an amalgam of styles, home to the royals when they’re in town.

Then on to the Cathedrale de Seville. Beyond description, beyond capturing.

A chapel in the Cathedral. Some of these were originally built as private chapels by wealthy families.

The organ is the second largest in Europe.

This tomb holds the remains of Christopher Columbus.

More from the Cathedral.

The collection spans 5000 years of art, sculpture and decorative objects. It’s a relatively small museum so you can see everything, and all of it is beautiful.

I liked this bronze barge from 380-343 B.C.

And this panel from 16th century Turkey:

A gallery in the museum:

 

This type of matched set of vases and jars is called a “garniture”.  They were originally used in China as alter pieces. Garnitures later became popular decorative items and were a sign of the family’s wealth.

The very impressive garniture below is close to two feet high. Hard to imagine where they put it.

The gardens surrounding the museum are very special and were created to harmonize with the galleries.

I was especially taken with the ducks and turtles.

It’s a very good place to be a duck.

“Look at me! I can stand on my head!”

We arrived yesterday in Lisbon and decided to spend today in Sintra, a town we visited and loved many years ago. So many more tourists than on our last visit! Fortunately we got an early start and were able to stay just ahead  of the crowd streaming toward the sights. Here’s the Pena Palace.After lunch we visited the Quinta da Regalia, an estate near the historic center. The Palace looks kind of spooky – the real attraction is the grounds, which are full of hidden grottoes,  waterfalls, underground tunnels, and statues.

View from the bottom of one of the “initiation wells” used for “ceremonial purposes”:

This guy is looking toward the  Palace, pictured below.

This is a small museum down the street from us – we’ve walked by it a dozen times. Just a few images that show how much beauty lies within this overlooked treasure of a place, which we had entirely to ourselves for an hour.

Yes, this is how many miles we walked on Sunday.

Here is the Se Cathedral.

Like all of the churches in Porto, it is an eye popping example of Baroque artistry and is covered from floor to ceiling in gilded carving.

Here is a view of the street below the Cathedral. If you look closely you can see the open shutter of our apartment window on the top floor of the middle building.

Below is the Church of the Franciscans. It is the most over the top of all the churches in Porto. No photography is allowed inside: I have included a photo from the guidebook. The Franciscans, of course, were not a flashy bunch. All of the guilded carving was added to the church in the 18th century by rich benefactors. Lots of money floating around at the time. The Portuguese Court was one of the wealthiest in a Europe.

The next pictures are from the tower and museum adjacent to the Church. Here we see the upside of being a wealthy woman in 18th century Porto. The chair is described as being for the transport of “ladies and the infirm”.

Then there’s the downside; this pic is from the catacombs in the church tower:

We strolled around in the afternoon.

Revived by a glass of wine,  we decided to take an afternoon cruise on the Douro. There are six bridges across the river from Porto to Vila de Gaia, which is home to many wineries.

This bridge, the Maria Pia Bridge, was designed by Gustav Eiffel.

You would think that that would have been it, and it would have been, until I realized that it was the last day of the Miro exhibit at the museum of contemporary art. It was also the last day of a gigantic arts festival, and the museum was open late, with free admission. We taxied over and arrived just after 6:00. HUGE  crowd, so we knew we were in the right place. 😬

We returned to Porto for dinner, which we finished at 11:00.

 

Up at the crack of noon, we managed to climb the Clerigos Tower, take in the beautiful Porto train station, visit the bookstore made famous by Harry Potter and his friends and visit two of the city’s beautiful churches.